Just wondering if anyone knows how to add a context menu item to ALL the file types. I know how to add an item to a specific type, but not all of them. Thanks

Ha ha! It's always great when you figure something out for yourself! In case anyone else cares... I wanted to add a "View in Notepad" item to the context menu so that no matter what the filetype was, I could quickly see what it was in notepad. Here's how: (Obviously the ''s are there only to show values, don't type them). Open regedit and go to HKCR and there should be a '*' key. Expand this. Now, if there's not one already, make a new key under '*' named 'shell'. Under this make a new key named 'View in Notepad' (note this is the text shone on the menu). Under this key make a new key named 'command'. In this key set the (Default) value to the command line you want to run. In my example I used '"C:\Windows\notepad.exe" %1'. Tada! No need to reboot, just try right clicking a file, any file.

You know that's another thing I did today... I was fooling around in the associations and I saw there were two folder ones (they both act on the folders in the registry one is under folders and the other directories). I added some context items... and then I closed it. Now for some reason (don't ask me why or how) "open command window here" (which I didn't add what I was adding was png2bmp, bmp2png and pngcrush without much success i admit) became the default! I had to right click and click on OPEN to open the damn folders!! What's worse on shortcuts (to folders) "Open" wasn't even in there!! So I deleted the OPEN COMMAND WINDOW here key and did it fix it? NO! So anyway I noticed open was in the Folder key but not in the Directory key, so I cloned HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\open\ to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell\open\ and vola! solved. XP and it's stupid problems!! Just thought I'd share this :) Daniel

Glad you fixed your problem. Certaintly a word of warning regarding file associations. BE CAREFUL, and be prepared to reinstall Windows if you play with file associations in the registry, ESPECIALLY File Folders, Folders, and Directories. These are very easy to screw up, and very hard (sometimes essentially impossible) to fix. Always, ALWAYS backup your registry!